Chapter 28 · The Moon Takes Blood

"Sienna!" Kael hit the stone floor hard, knife in hand, and rolled toward the circle's edge.

The blood runes were burning white-hot now. Sienna knelt in the center, head bowed, her wolf rippling under her skin like something trying to claw its way out. Leah was flat on her back three feet away, eyes rolled back, convulsing.

Asher stood outside the circle with his hands folded, watching.

"Stop it," Kael said. "Now."

"I'm not doing anything." Asher's voice was calm. Pleasant, even. "The circle feeds on what's already there. Judge Hale's bloodline is old. Very old. It remembers what it was before she buried it."

Sienna's head snapped up. Her eyes were wolf-gold, pupils blown wide. "Kael."

Her voice cracked on his name.

He moved without thinking, stepped toward the circle's edge. The air shimmered, hot and wrong, and the bond in his chest pulled tight like a wire about to snap.

"Don't," Asher said. "Cross that line and the circle takes you too. Blood calls to blood. You're fated to her. That makes you part of the equation."

Kael stopped. His hand was two inches from the rune-carved floor. "What does it want?"

"Proof." Asher tilted his head.